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Theo and Sam Make Paleo and Vegan Pizza

Hi everyone! Welcome to another week of Paleo and Vegan recipes. This week we're exploring one of the things that most people are incredibly reluctant to give up when they switch their lifestyle to a paleo or vegan one: pizza! America's favorite food is incredibly convenient for many families to buy/make fresh or frozen or go out to a restaurant to eat it. We tried to figure out two easy recipes for our readers to make which are easy, healthy, and delicious. The sauce and toppings can be substituted for whatever your favorite sauces/toppings are but I love the flavor of this caramelized version. I hope you enjoy these two recipes!

For the Pizza Sauce:

Yields enough sauce for about three small pizzas

1 24-oz can of whole peeled tomatoes

1 bell pepper, cut into eighths

1 onion, cut into eighths

3 cloves of garlic, halved

fresh herbs (oregano, thyme, basil... I use a few sprigs of thyme and oregano and a handful of basil)

drizzle of olive oil

salt and pepper to taste

Add cut up vegetables to a Pyrex lasagna pan or a metal roasting pan.

Drizzle olive oil on top to coat vegetables and season with salt and pepper.

Put pan directly under a broiler on high and turn every 5-10 minutes, making sure that nothing burns

When vegetables are caramelized, remove and blend with fresh or dried herbs in a blender or with an immersion blender until the sauce is the consistency of pizza sauce.

For the Paleo Crust:

1 Against the Grain three cheese paleo pizza crust

Follow directions on crust packaging (add toppings and bake.)

Done!

For the Vegan Crust:

Yields approximately 2 small pizza crusts

3 cups flour

3 Tbsp fast rising yeast

1 tsp salt

1-2 Tbsp olive oil

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

In a bowl combine the flour, salt, and yeast.

Add warm water and oil mixture to the flour and knead with your hands for about 5 minutes until the dough forms a smooth ball.

Let the dough sit with a towel over it in your warm kitchen.

Remove the dough ball from the bowl and roll it out on a sheet of parchment paper on a cookie sheet/pizza pan.

Bake the crust in the oven until slightly cooked and lightly browned, approximately 10 minutes.

Remove from oven and add toppings.

Finishing the Pizzas:

Now that you have one or two pizza crusts, here comes the fun part!

First top the crust with the sauce you made or bought.

Then add your favorite pizza toppings to it: I use pepperoni, peppers, mushrooms, olives, onion slices, garlic, basil, and so many more toppings!

Finally top with some mozzarella, cheddar, vegan cheese shreds, or whatever cheese you want and bake in the oven until cheese is bubbly and the crust is cooked. The vegan crust and paleo crusts should both take about 12-15 minutes to bake. After baking I like to add chopped basil, Parmesan cheese, and red pepper flakes. I also finished my paleo pizza with some fresh oregano.

Sam put chopped Field Roast sausage on top of her vegan pizza for some pizazz!

I hope you enjoyed these recipes for pizza! A lot of people don't realize you can still get fairly healthy paleo and vegan versions of pizza with simple substitutes like Against the Grain crust and vegan cheese shreds. I like doubling the recipes and having leftover pizza for a couple days... or tripling the recipes. See you next week!

Theo Wecker is responsible for all of the photographs here, and you can see more of his work at Theo Wecker Photography